I was never really any good at colouring in.
I coloured outside the lines, my patience wore thin.
I always stuck to scribbling words on pages instead.
At a young age I wrote down stories I’d make up inside my head.
As I got older, poems were a cure. Poems were a cure for my teenage angst and heartbreak.
School exams, pfft, they were a breeze. In Year Twelve I wrote so many pages for the HSC that I burned a callous into my right pinky finger, a bump I brandish to this day, and proudly so.

The first occupation I ever wanted was to be a veterinarian, but it was the second one that truly stuck. I always felt my purpose in life was to be a writer. I said the words first in Year One — “I want to be an author”. As the years went on I continued to have a strong and healthy relationship with words and writing; in university I dedicated six long years to pursuing my passion as a journalist. Not without the challenges, and always in the final throes. It was only as I got older did I realise the importance of staying on track, of sticking to your purpose. But that’s easier said than done.

When you haven’t anybody there, no teacher, no mentor, just you and yourself… How do you do it? How do you stay on the fine line; keep on that thick black running track? How do you find the time, or the want, or the discipline to go right ahead and stick to your purpose, to stick it the parts of yourself, your shadow selves, that make you doubt all the years and all the tears that went into — shaping you, defining your purpose.

It’s rough.

And I —
I am a mixture of both water and the wind. My hair grows long and catches in the breeze, and underneath the surface I have a river flow of feelings, often mixed feelings, and mood swings. Like a monkey swinging from the tree tops, I cannot find a place to stop. But maybe I don’t want to.

At home, I listen to the sounds of birds and it is the kookaburra’s laugh that I love the most. He knows his purpose; his friends join in on laughing too, at timely moments of the day. I record them on my iPhone. The kookaburra’s purpose is simple; it is to laugh, and live. When I was twenty-one I tattooed the words “to live and to love” in Spanish cursive along the lefthand side of my body. That’s another of my soul’s purpose.

When there’s so many things we want to achieve in this life, how can we stick to just the one?

I yearn to continue to redefine my purpose in different places of my world.

What’s the point? What’s your purpose? Have you got one? Have you got many, or any at all?
Do you know what it is that your heart and soul burns to do?

I hope that you do.

And if you don’t, not yet know, I hope you can keep on navigating these unknown waters, with nothing but tranquility.

Writing prompt 1: complete.